properly · preposition + noun, common masculine singular absolute
Strong's Exhaustive Concordance (James Strong, 1890/1894), public domain; digitized by Open Scriptures (CC BY-SA). KJV word tagging: eBible.org (public domain). Original-language text, parsing and brief lexicon: STEPBible.org data from Tyndale House, Cambridge (CC BY 4.0).
Cross-references
Proverbs 3:24 When thou liest down, thou shalt not be afraid: yea, thou shalt lie down, and thy sleep shall be sweet.
Psalms 3:5 I laid me down and slept; I awaked; for the LORD sustained me.
Job 11:18-19 And thou shalt be secure, because there is hope; yea, thou shalt dig about thee, and thou shalt take thy rest in safety.
Psalms 16:8-9 I have set the LORD always before me: because he is at my right hand, I shall not be moved.
1 Thessalonians 5:10 Who died for us, that, whether we wake or sleep, we should live together with him.
Deuteronomy 12:10 But when ye go over Jordan, and dwell in the land which the LORD your God giveth you to inherit, and when he giveth you rest from all your e…
Leviticus 25:18-19 Wherefore ye shall do my statutes, and keep my judgments, and do them; and ye shall dwell in the land in safety.
Hosea 2:18 And in that day will I make a covenant for them with the beasts of the field, and with the fowls of heaven, and with the creeping things of…
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Psalms 4:6–end
We have here,
I. The foolish wish of worldly people: There be many that say, Who will show us any good? Who will make us to see good? What good they meant is intimated, Psa 4:7. It was the increase of their corn and wine; all they desired was plenty of the wealth of this world, that they might enjoy abundance of the delights of sense. Thus far they are right, that they are desirous of good and solicitous about it; but there are these things amiss in this wish: - 1. They enquire, in general, "Who will make us happy?" but do not apply themselves to God who alone can; and so they expose themselves to be ill-advised, and show they would rather be beholden to any than to God, for they would willi…
both lay me down, &c.--or, will lie down at once, and sleep in sure confidence and quiet repose (Psa 3:5).
Next: Psalms Chapter 5
John Gill on Psalms 4:8
I will both lay me down in peace, and sleep,.... Signifying, that he had such a calmness and serenity of mind, amidst all his troubles, that he could not only lay himself down in great peace, and much composure of mind, but sleep also, and that as soon as laid down almost; some lay themselves down, but cannot sleep, through the anxiety of their minds; but the psalmist could do both: or the word rendered "both" may he translated "together" (u); and the sense be either that he would lie down and sleep together with his friends, committing himself and them to the care and protection of God; or that he should lie down and sleep together with his enemies; meaning that he was assured that there wo…
Psalm 4:8
8. I will lay me down, and will sleep together in peace; for thou, Lord, hast placed me alone [63] in safety.
He concludes, by stating, that as he is protected by the power of God, he enjoys as much security and quiet as if he had been defended by all the garrisons on earth. Now, we know, that to be free from all fear, and from the torment and vexation of care, is a blessing to be desired above all other things. This verse, therefore, is a confirmation of the former sentence, intimating that David justly prefers the joy produced by the light of God's fatherly love before all other objects for inward peace of mind certainly surpasses all the blessings of which we can form any conc…
The Church Fathers
I will lie down and rest as I await the future age and the reward of a right life, and as I have been made secure beyond every disturbance because of my hope.
Even if grief, calamities, temptations, disasters are not lacking to me in this present life, nevertheless there is a future time for me in which I will depart from the body and sleep in peace.
Nothing, you see, is so calculated to bring peace as knowledge of God and possession of virtue, banishing afar conflict of the passions and not allowing one to be at odds with oneself. Unless … you enjoy this kind of peace, then no matter if you are at peace abroad and no enemy assaults you, you are more miserable than the most embattled people in the world. You see, neither Scythians, nor Thracians, nor Indians, nor Moors nor any other hostile races are capable of mounting such a conflict as an uneasy conscience gnawing at your soul, as untamed desire, as love of money, lust for power, addiction to mundane affairs.… Jealous, slanderous, greedy and rapacious people, you see, carry around with them everywhere this warfare, bearing within them enemies lying in ambush. No matter where they retreat to, they cannot avoid conflict; even if they stay at home and go to bed, they are under attack from clouds of arrows, disturbances more violent than pounding seas, massacres and uproar and lamentation and other calamities more disastrous than those occurring in battle. Righteous persons, on the contrary, are not in this predicament; rather, in their waking hours they enjoy life, and in nighttime they take their rest with great satisfaction.
The Church Fathers: public-domain translations (Ante-Nicene and Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers), verse-indexed by SermonIndex (CC BY 4.0).
Dictionary and topics
Neginoth — I.e., songs with instrumental accompaniment, found in the titles of Ps. 4; 6; 54; 55; 67; 76; rendered “stringed instruments,” Hab. 3:19, A.V. It denotes all kinds of stringed instruments, as the…
Peace · SPIRITUAL — SPIRITUAL
Peace, Spiritual · Saints: Repose in — Saints: Repose in
Protection · Is vouchsafed to saints in: Sleep — Is vouchsafed to saints in: Sleep
Dictionary: Easton's (1897) and Smith's (1863), public domain. Topics: Nave's Topical Bible (1896) and Torrey's Topical Textbook (1897), public domain. Both as parsed by NEUU (CC BY 4.0).
(Heb.: 4:9) Thus then he lies down to sleep, cheerfully and peacefully. The hymn closes as it began with a three line verse. יחדּוּ (lit., in its unions = collectively, Olshausen, 135, c, like כּלּו altogether, בּעתּו at the right time) is by no means unemphatic; nor is it so in Psa 19:10 where it means "all together, without exception." With synonymous verbs it denotes the combination of that which they imply, as Isa 42:14. It is similar in Psa 141:10 where it expresses the coincidence of the fall of his enemies and the escape of the persecuted one. So here: he wishes to go to sleep and also at once he falls asleep (ואישׁן in a likewise cohortative sense = ואישׁנה). His God makes him to dwe…
Peace comes from God’s blessing and protection (4:6; see 37:11).
Spurgeon's Treasury of David on Psalms 4:8
I will both lay me down in peace, and sleep: for thou, Lord, only makest me dwell in safety.
Sweet Evening Hymn! I shall not sit up to watch through fear, but I will lie down; and then I will not lie awake listening to every rustling sound, but I will lie down in peace and sleep, for I have nought to fear. He that hath the wings of God above him needs no other curtain. Better than bolts or bars is the protection of the Lord. Armed men kept the bed of Solomon, but we do not believe that he slept more soundly than his father, whose bed was the hard ground, and who was haunted by blood-thirsty foes. Note the word "only", which means that God alone was his keeper, and that though alone, without…
